Bertie Lewis

In 1982 he was expelled by his local branch of the British Legion after he laid a wreath bearing the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament symbol at the Cenotaph in Bolton on Remembrance Sunday.

Lewis said that by opposing nuclear weapons and campaigning for peace he was doing nothing more than following the spirit of the words carved on the base of the Cenotaph in Bolton which read "Our brothers died to win a better world.

The national British Legion later ordered his reinstatement following a public outcry and Lewis continued to lay a wreath, often including white poppies each year as part of the official Remembrance Day ceremony until his death in 2010.

[7] He attended many protests during his life including the famous 1968 demonstration against the Vietnam War that ended in violence outside the US Embassy in Grosvenor Square, London.

[8] During the visit of President Ronald Reagan to London in 1984 Lewis managed to take his message inside the U.S. Embassy while thousands protested outside against the deployment of American cruise missiles on British soil.

At age 89 he was the oldest member of the group Military Families Against the War delivering a petition to 10 Downing Street calling for British servicemen and women to be brought home from Afghanistan.